Corsair VX450W Power Supply Review

External Impressions

After taking the power supply out of the bag that it came in, the VX450W was found to be matte black just like the HX series. All of the cables are sleeved with a black nylon mesh, which is something not too common in the value power supply market. The green and black labels on the sides and back of the power supply housing look great on the black finish. Although Corsair hasn’t said anything about color coding their power supplies it seems as though the colors go with their power rating.

• Green – VX450W
• Yellow – HX520W
• Orange – VX550W
• Red – HX620W

Flipping the unit over we discover the 120mm fan that pushes out the hot air from the power supply and the black fan grill that covers it. The VX450W has a universal AC input and automatically scans and detects the correct voltage as long as it is between 90 to 264V. This elimates the red switch that often needed to be switched for those in foreign countries!

The efficiency of the power supply is dependent on the current, so if you have the choice between 10A/115V and 5A/230V wiring in your home the latter would be ideal!

The label on the power supply lists the ratings of the power supply and gives the serial number and other information like the revision number. The UL number (E307858) comes back to Corsair, but it’s no secret that Seasonic is making both the VX and HX series for Corsair. The specifications on the power supply are also found on this label. On modern computers the +12V rail is the most important to pay attention to and the CMPSU-450VX has a dedicated solid single +12V rail of 33A (41A on 550W). Being rated at 33A it means that this power supply will easily handle any single high end graphics card on the market today from both ATI and NVIDIA.

Both of the Corsair VX Series power supplies conform to ATX12V 2.2 standards and are backwards compatible with ATX12V 2.01 systems. The VX Series supports ATX 24pin and 20pin, ATX12V 4pin, ESP12V 8pin, PCI-E 6-pin, SATA, 4-pin peripheral and floppy connectors.